Reason,

 

The fact that nobody – not even we ourselves – can tell us how to talk, signifies the end of our negative   Disembodied Language (DL). The reason this isn’t as clear to us as it should be, is because we are in denial about the reality, that our DL is on it’s deathbed. The times, that speakers can continue to dominate listeners are finished, for good. While we continue to do everything, to avoid considering the major implications of this quintessential event in the history of mankind, the unraveling and unmasking of our problematic, habitual, dumb DL is already happening and is only going to happen even more. 

 

While few people have some understanding about why our mechanical way of talking and our usual way of dealing with language clearly isn’t working, it is evident to anyone, who knows about the great  difference between our DL and Embodied Language (EL), we keep creating more problems with what we are doing. DL is always about what others have said or written. Even if we try to listen to ourselves, the chances, we really hear ourselves, are very small to non-existent. Our own voice continuously overrules what we sound like, if, for some reason, we don’t sound how we usually sound. Thus, our EL separates us from everyone with DL, which is… everyone.

 

Reason – defined as the ability to form and operate concepts in abstraction, in accordance with logic and rationality – has a long history in philosophy, but nobody has ever connected the dots, that our common, coercive, punitive, mechanical, insensitive way of talking, DL, is unreasonable. Until today, we  have lived with the mere illusion of reason. Strictly speaking (pun intended), we couldn’t have lost all reason, as we never attained the ability in the first place, to use our language correctly and engage EL.

 

As the definition and, therefore, our understanding  about reason itself suggests, there is this ancient  assumption, that we have a mind or a conscience and can talk covertly, privately, silently, abstractly, with ourselves, instead of with others. However, it is our way of talking itself or rather, the ubiquity of DL, which creates and sustains this fallacy. The abstract aspect of reason, is based on the unintelligent way of talking, in which we don’t listen to ourselves and, consequently, begin to imagine things, to fill in the gaps, because so many things simply remain unsaid.

 

Abstract, comes from Latin, abstrahere. It has the word-forming element ab, which means, away from, denoting separation, disjunction or departure and trahere to draw. Abstrahere means to drag away, pull, detach or divert. Furthermore, abstract also contains the word tract, which comes from Latin tractus and means track, course, space, duration or lapse of time. Our commonly accepted so-called ability to reason abstractly and presumably create and form ideas and concepts, inside of our heads,  which are – doesn’t that sound circular to you? – in accordance with rationality and logic, is based on being dissociated and disconnected from our body. Debate or discussion about the nature, limits and causes of reason, has never involved any EL, but always DL and, not surprisingly, always gave more importance to written, than to spoken language.      

 

The etymology of reason is also worth looking into. It derives from the Latin word rationem, which means reckoning, understanding, motive or cause. Also, the concept of reason itself, is, of course – how could it be otherwise? – connected to our language, that is, not to the concept of language, but to our embodied or disembodied experience of language. The ancient Greek word logos, which means word, or discourse, is also related to reason. Rationality, reason or logic are associated, not with the fictitious human mind, but with the way in which we actually talk with each other and, therefore, create order or disorder. Reason can be synonymously used with the word cause, because once we have ongoing EL, we become rational about everything, we were emotionally carried away about, due to our DL.  

 

Since there is no inner me, who does the speaking or the reasoning; since there is no inner listener, who does the listening or the understanding; since there is only speaking and listening and this writing about this speaking and listening; since there is, at this moment, your reading of this writing; since there is, of course, no reader inside of you, who reads and understands; since there is only the living act of reading and your experience of understanding (if you didn’t know English, these words would be meaningless); since speaking, listening, writing and reading are real activities, which express what we are capable of or not, we engage in EL or DL. In DL, we underperform, because we remain irrational.